Editor's note: This report compiles all relevant news, events and materials on International and European Sports Law based on the daily coverage provided on our twitter feed @Sportslaw_asser. You are invited to complete this survey via the comments section below, feel free to add links to important cases, documents and articles we might have overlooked.

The Headlines

FIFA and FIFPro sign landmark agreement

A six-year cooperation agreement concluded between FIFA and FIFPro on 6 November 2017 puts an end to protracted negotiations which began after the latter had filed in September 2015 a complaint with the European Commission, challenging the validity of the FIFA transfer system under EU competition law. This agreement, together with an accord reached between FIFA, FIFPro, the European Club Association, and the World Leagues Forum under the umbrella of the FIFA Football Stakeholders Committee, should help streamline dispute resolution between players and clubs, avoid abusive practices in the world of football, or contribute to the growth of professional women's football. In addition, the FIFA Football Stakeholders Committee is now expected to establish a task force to study and conduct a broader review of the transfer system. As part of the deal, FIFPro agreed to withdraw its EU competition law complaint.

It is fair to say that human rights have been at the forefront of FIFA's agenda in 2017. Following the establishment of the Human Rights Advisory Board in March and the adoption of the Human Rights Policy in June this year, in November FIFA published the bidding regulations for the 2026 World Cup. Under these new regulations, member associations bidding to host the final tournament shall, inter alia, commit themselves to respecting all internationally recognised human rights in line with the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights or present a human rights strategy on how they intend to honour this commitment. Importantly, the human rights strategy must include a comprehensive report that is to be complemented and informed by a study elaborated by an independent expert organisation. Moreover, on 9 November 2017, the Human Rights Advisory Board published its first report in which it outlined several recommendations for FIFA on how to further strengthen its efforts to ensure respect for human rights.

While all these attempts to enhance human rights protection are no doubt praiseworthy, they have not yet produced the desired effect as reports of gross human rights abuses linked to FIFA's activities continue to emerge. Most recently, Human Rights Watch documented how Russian police arrested a newspaper editor and a human rights defender whose work focused on exposing World Cup-related corruption and exploitation of migrant construction workers. On a more positive note, a bit of hope comes with the announcement by a diverse coalition, including FIFA, UEFA, and the International Olympic Committee, of its intention to launch a new independent Centre for Sport and Human Rights in 2018.

More than 20 Russian athletes sanctioned by the Oswald Commission for anti-doping rule violations at the Sochi Games

November has been a busy month for the International Olympic Committee, especially for its Oswald Commission. Established in July 2016 after the first part of the McLaren Independent Investigation Report had been published, the Oswald Commission is tasked with investigating the alleged doping violations by Russian athletes at the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi. Its first sanctions were handed down last month. As of 30 November 2017, the Commission chaired by the IOC Member Denis Oswald sanctioned 22 athletes (see here, here, here, here, here, and here) who competed at the Sochi Olympics in the following sports: biathlon, bobsleigh, cross country skiing, skeleton, and speed skating. The Commission published its first full decision on 27 November 2017 in the case against the cross country skier Alexander Legkov, a gold and silver medallist from the Sochi Olympics, who was ultimately banned for life from attending another Olympics.More...

Close to 100 participants from 37 different countries attended the first ISLJ Annual International Sports Law Conference that took place on 26-27 October 2017 in The Hague. The two-day programme featured panels on the FIFA transfer system, the labour rights and relations in sport, the protection of human rights in sport, EU law and sport, the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and the world anti-doping system. On top of that, a number of keynote speakers presented their views on contemporary topics and challenges in international sports law. This report provides a brief summary of the conference for both those who could not come and those who participated and would like to relive their time spent at the T.M.C. Asser Institute.More...

Editor’s note: Josep F. Vandellos Alamilla is an
international sports lawyer and academic based in Valencia (Spain) and a member
of the Editorial Board of the publication Football Legal. Since 2017 he is the
Director of the Global Master in Sports
Management and Legal Skills FC Barcelona – ISDE.

I think we would all agree that the reputation of
players’ agents, nowadays called intermediaries, has never been a good one for
plenty of reasons. But the truth is their presence in the football industry is
much needed and probably most of the transfers would never take place if these
outcast members of the self-proclaimed football
family were not there to ensure a fluid and smooth communication between all
parties involved.

For us, sports lawyers, intermediaries are also
important clients as they often need our advice to structure the deals in which
they take part. One of the most recurrent situations faced by intermediaries and
agents operating off-the-radar (i.e. not registered in any football association
member of FIFA) is the risk of entering in a so-called multiparty or dual representation
and the potential risks associated with such a situation.

The representation of the interests of multiple
parties in football intermediation can take place for instance when the agent represents
the selling club, the buying club and/or the player in the same transfer, or when
the agent is remunerated by multiple parties, and in general when the agent incurs
the risk of jeopardizing the trust deposited upon him/her by the principal. The
situations are multiple and can manifest in different manners.

This article will briefly outline the regulatory
framework regarding multiparty representation applicable to registered
intermediaries. It will then focus on provisions of Swiss law and the
identification of the limits of dual representation in the light of the CAS
jurisprudence and some relevant decisions of the Swiss Federal Tribunal.More...

Editor's Note: Frans M. de Weger is legal counsel for the Federation of Dutch Professional Football Clubs (FBO) and CAS arbitrator. De Weger is author of the book “The Jurisprudence of the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber”, 2nd edition, published by T.M.C. Asser Press in 2016. Frank John Vrolijk specialises in Sports, Labour and Company Law and is a former legal trainee of FBO and DRC Database.

This second blog will focus
specifically on the sanctions available for FIFA under Article 12bis. It will provide
explanatory guidelines covering the sanctions imposed during the period
surveyed.

Introduction

The possibility to impose
sanctions under article 12bis constitutes one of the pillars of the 12bis
procedure. Pursuant to Article 12bis of the RSTP, edition 2016, the DRC and the
PSC may impose a sanction on a club if the club is found to have delayed a due
payment for more than 30 days without a prima
facie contractual basis[1] and the creditor have put
the debtor club in default in writing, granting a deadline of at least 10 days.[2] The jurisprudence in
relation to Article 12bis also shows that sanctions are imposed ex officio by the DRC or the PSC and not
per request of the claimant.More...

Editor’s Note: Saverio Spera is an Italian lawyer and LL.M.
graduate in International Business Law at King’s College London. He is
currently an intern at the ASSER International Sports Law Centre.

This blog is a follow up to my previous contribution on the validity of Unilateral Extension Options
(hereafter UEOs) under national and European law. It focuses on the different
approaches taken to UEOs by the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber (DRC) and the
Court of arbitration for sport (CAS). While in general the DRC has adopted a
strict approach towards their validity, the CAS has followed a more liberal
trend. Nonetheless, the two judicial bodies share a common conclusion: UEOs are
not necessarily invalid. In this second blog I will provide an overview of the similarities
and differences of the two judicial bodies in tackling UEOs. More...

Editor’s note: Serhat
Yilmaz (@serhat_yilmaz)
is a lecturer in sports law in Loughborough University. His research focuses on
the regulatory framework applicable to intermediaries. Antoine Duval (@Ant1Duval) is the head of
the Asser International Sports Law Centre.

Last week, while FIFA was firing
the heads of its Ethics and Governance committees, the press was overwhelmed
with ‘breaking news’ on the most expensive transfer in history, the come back
of Paul Pogba from Juventus F.C. to Manchester United. Indeed, Politiken
(a Danish newspaper) and Mediapart
(a French website specialized in investigative journalism) had jointly
discovered in the seemingly endless footballleaks
files that Pogba’s agent, Mino Raiola, was involved (and financially
interested) with all three sides (Juventus, Manchester United and Pogba) of the
transfer. In fine, Raiola earned a grand total of € 49,000,000 out of the deal,
a shocking headline number almost as high as Pogba’s total salary at
Manchester, without ever putting a foot on a pitch. This raised eyebrows,
especially that an on-going investigation by FIFA into the transfer was
mentioned, but in the media the sketching of the legal situation was very often
extremely confusing and weak. Is this type of three-way representation legal
under current rules? Could Mino Raiola, Manchester United, Juventus or Paul
Pogba face any sanctions because of it? What does this say about the
effectiveness of FIFA’s Regulations
on Working with Intermediaries? All these questions deserve thorough
answers in light of the publicity of this case, which we ambition to provide in
this blog.More...

Doyen (aka Doyen Sports Investment Limited) is
nothing short of heroic in its fight against FIFA’s TPO ban. It has (sometimes
indirectly through RFC Seraing) attacked the ban in front of the French courts,
the Belgium courts, the European Commission and the Court of Arbitration for
Sport. This costly, and until now fruitless, legal battle has been chronicled
in numerous of our blogs (here
and here).
It is coordinated by Jean-Louis Dupont, a lawyer who is, to say the least, not
afraid of fighting the windmills of sport’s private regulators. Yet, this time
around he might have hit the limits of his stubbornness and legal ‘maestria’.
As illustrated by the most recent decision of the saga, rendered in March by
the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in a case opposing the Belgium club
RFC Seraing (or Seraing) to FIFA. The arguments in favour of the ban might override
those against it. At least this is the view espoused by the CAS, and until
tested in front of another court (preferably the CJEU) it will remain an influential
one. The French text of the CAS award has just been published
and I will take the opportunity of having for once an award in my native
language to offer a first assessment of the CAS’s reasoning in the case,
especially with regard to its application of EU law. More...

Editor’s Note: Saverio Spera
is an Italian lawyer and LL.M. graduate in International Business Law at King’s
College London. He is currently an intern at the ASSER International Sports Law
Centre.

In the
football world the use of unilateral extension options (hereafter UEOs) in
favour of the clubs is common practice. Clubs in Europe and, especially, South
America make extensive use of this type of contractual clauses, since it gives
them the exclusive possibility to prolong the employment relationship with
players whose contracts are about to come to an end. This option gives to a
club the right to extend the duration of a player’s contract for a certain
agreed period after its initial expiry, provided that some previously
negotiated conditions are met. In particular, these clauses allow clubs to sign
young promising players for short-term contracts, in order to ascertain their
potential, and then extend the length of their contracts.[1]
Here lies the great value of UEOs for clubs: they can let the player go if he
is not performing as expected, or unilaterally retain him if he is deemed
valuable. Although an indisputably beneficial contractual tool for any football
club, these clauses are especially useful to clubs specialized in the
development of young players.[2] After
the Bosman
case, clubs have increasingly used these clauses in order to prevent players
from leaving their clubs for free at the end of their contracts.[3] The
FIFA Regulations do not contain any provisions regulating this practice,
consequently the duty of clarifying the scope and validity of the options lied
with the national courts, the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber (DRC) and the
CAS. This two-part blog will attempt to provide the first general overview on
the issue.[4] My
first blog will be dedicated to the validity of UEOs clauses in light of
national laws and of the jurisprudence of numerous European jurisdictions. In a
second blog, I will review the jurisprudence of the DRC and the CAS on this
matter. More...

Editor's note: Adriaan Wijckmans is an associate specialized in sports law at the Belgium law firm Altius.

In a recent judgment, the Brussels Court of
First Instance confirmed the legality of a so-called surety undertaking, i.e. an
agreement in which the parents of a minor playing football guarantee that their
child will sign a professional contract with a football club as soon as the child
reaches the legal age of majority.

This long-awaited ruling was hailed, on the one hand, by clubs as a
much needed and eagerly anticipated confirmation of a long-standing practice in
Belgian football[1] and, on
the other hand, criticised by FIFPro, the international
player’s trade union, in a scathing press release. More...

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This blog is a knowledge hub for all things related with International Sports Law. On this page, you will find the recent developments in the field: publications, events and cases. Moreover, we will provide outstanding (short) academic commentaries on the most pressing questions in International Sports Law.